Mile 21

Marathons – the literal race: I’ve run one. It was a marathon to get to that marathon, since months of training and a “Plains, Trains and Automobiles” type effort to get to our intended race destination ultimately resulted in weather cancellation. We were set for Dallas, 2013, but Texas does not do icy. To say the cancellation was a major disappointment is understatement in the extreme.

My wife and I got over it (sort of), trained for a few more months and ran The Charlevoix Marathon in June of 2014.

When training for a first marathon, you never run the entire 26 (we didn’t anyway). Because of this, the only impression I have left of running our first is hitting a wall at mile 21. It felt like someone snuck up and poured concrete in my shoes.

Would I run one again? Difficult to say, but I’m definitely not hankering to do it again. Running is good and there are so many benefits, but running 26.2 takes months of commitment and so I’m going to say that it’s probably not in the cards for me right now. Of course, the days keep peeling off the calendar so it’s not going to ever get any easier to do.

Figurative marathons, there are so many. Our lives are all marathons within a marathon.

To run these races, your training and discipline must be solid. It also helps to have a good partner running by your side. And if you feel like dropping out, go a little further. You might just be experiencing mile 21.